Boris Johnson held off the challenge of former mayor Ken Livingstone to retain his place in London's City Hall, from where Hugh Muir reports. But it was a terrible day elsewhere for the Conservatives. Labour made gains across the country as the government parties were punished in a set of local elections in which more than two thirds of voters abstained.

In Scotland SNP members were nursing their wounds after failing to capture Glasgow City Council as they'd hoped. Severin Carrell explains Labour took control of that city, and became the largest force in Edinburgh too.

In Wales there was more good news for Ed Miliband. After a set of terrible results under Gordon Brown in the 2008 local elections, Labour regained old ground and took control of Cardiff from the Lib Dems. The Guardian's Steven Morris was on hand to tell us how.

In England Labour took further councils - some of them on huge swings from coalition parties. Meanwhile the electorate were distinctly uninterested in voting for more elected mayors in a day of poor turnouts across the country. James Ball and Martin Kettle crunch the numbers.

And minority parties such as Ukip and the Greens made gains in their share of the vote but the BNP slumped to humiliating defeats in the council seats it was defending.